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Posted on: April 7, 2011

Christopher Robert Youngs Found Guilty of Child Pornography

PHOENIX, AZ (April 7, 2011) – A jury has found Christopher Robert Youngs (DOB 8/4/1949) guilty on ten class 2 felony counts of sexual exploitation of a minor in connection with a planned cross-country spree of sadistic sexual acts against children. Youngs, a dual citizen of England and New Zealand, faces a possible prison term of 100 to 240 years when he is sentenced on May 12th.

“The graphic images and depictions of sexual exploitation presented in this crime make it one of the worst cases – if not the worst case – of child pornography our office has ever prosecuted,” said Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery. “Savage child predators like Christopher Youngs are the reason why Arizona has among the toughest penalties in the country against pedophiles and possessors of child pornography and why I will continue to fight to put these criminals in prison for as long as possible,” he added.

In early December, 2008, Youngs travelled from Qatar to Washington, D.C. and then to Omaha, Nebraska where he rented a moving box truck and travelled throughout the Midwest before coming to Arizona. Throughout his journey, Youngs engaged in a series of online chats with an undercover detective in which he stated that the purpose of his visit to the United States to meet minor females for sexual contact. He discussed numerous previous and planned encounters with young children involving violent sexual acts. Youngs also detailed his specific plans to kidnap and sexually assault a 12 year-old female in San Diego, and stated he was holding a 14 year-old female captive in Tempe and was sodomizing her with a table leg. Young also expressed his belief that if he were apprehended for these acts, he would likely face relatively easy treatment in the U.S. criminal justice system

“Preying on children is simply unconscionable. Youngs travelled the globe exploiting, victimizing and causing children to suffer. For me as Police Chief, heinous criminal behavior such as this takes the highest priority,” said Tempe Chief of Police Tom Ryff. “The partnership between the Maricopa County Attorney and Tempe Police and the resulting conviction demonstrates that our Criminal Justice system will prosecute these offenders to the fullest extent, making Tempe and communities across the world safer for the most vulnerable and precious members of our society.”

Based on Youngs’ online chats, Tempe Police Department conducted a welfare check at Youngs’ hotel room where they found blood smears in multiple locations, a computer and flash drive loaded with hundreds of child pornography images and video, and a handwritten list of names of possible minors he had contacted online and had scheduled to meet. In Youngs’ car, police found rope, knives, zip ties, lubricant and a sex toy. Additional child pornography videos were found on an external hard drive and two flash drives recovered during a search of another hotel room Young had rented but not checked out of in Tucson. Among the pornographic content were multiple videos depicting sexual acts with children under the age of 5 years old.